Tennis practice courts in the past have been essentially half courts which have been operated for the purpose of allowing an individual to practice without a partner. In some cases, full courts have been utilized; but in any of the systems that have used machines which drive balls to the tennis player, there has always been a problem in returning the balls to the machine. A standard form of a half court, for example, is seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,025,071 where the balls are retrieved with a sloping ramp which requires special court construction. In many cases it is desirable to have a ball retrieving apparatus operating in a full tennis court, which can be used both for normal playing and for practice. This invention is therefore directed to a ball retrieving apparatus that operates in a full tennis court where a tennis player has the opportunity to develop his game and playing ability and to see where his balls actually land. With the present invention there are no ramps that need to be formed in a back court and the invention can be utilized without any structural modification to an existing tennis court.